Data is not exactly the sexiest thing in the world, but in #lovelansing, our local workforce development agency Capital Area Michigan Works! partners with our regional economic development organization Leap, Inc. to help economic developers, K-12 education, higher ed and business make smarter decisions about our future.

Based on labor market information from the Michigan Bureau of Labor Market Information and Strategic Initiatives and data from the US Department of Labor, Census Bureau and elsewhere, we gather a group of businesses each year to take a look at a specific sector or trend and ask, what’s happening in this particular industry? What are the trends? Growth? Decline? Do we have the workforce to meet those businesses’ demands now? In the future? And what more can be done to support businesses?

In the past, we’ve looked at manufacturing, healthcare, construction, IT, insurance and financial services, green jobs and the creative economy, as well as what will happen in the greater Lansing economy when the Baby Boomers retire. As a result of these studies, seven trade associations have been formed and received grant funding to help specific sectors address their workforce concerns.

In 2011, we’ll be focusing on talent. As home to Michigan State University, Lansing Community College and the Thomas M. Cooley Law School, along with more than a dozen other higher education institutions, we want to know what it takes to keep knowledge economy workers, and we want to know the truth about brain drain in Michigan.

Copies of the past four years’ reports are available at:

http://www.camw.org/MediaRoom